Automatic doors are doors that are powered open or powered closed or both. If an automatic door is powered open only, then, it is conventionally spring closed or hydraulically closed. Automatic doors conventionally employ a sensor or switch to activate the door. The sensor detects approaching traffic and may be a motion sensor, infrared sensor, or pressure sensor. The switch is conventionally operated manually and may take the form of a push button, swipe card, or other available switch type access or security system. Alternatively the switch may be activated by pushing or pulling the door, so that once the door detects the movement it completes the open and close cycle. These are also known as power assisted doors.
Swinging doors are hinged and pivot around an axis in an inward or outward direction or both. Automatic swinging doors are coupled to a source of torque, that is, a door operating apparatus, for providing the force necessary to pivot the door open or closed or both. Most commercially available door operating apparatuses are electromechanical or electrohydraulic and are positioned above the door in an overhead position for ease and economy of installation. Most commercially available door operating apparatuses are spring closed.
U.S. Pat. No. 6,176,044 (incorporated herein by reference) discloses a kit and method for retrofitting electromechanical door operating apparatuses. The retrofit kit shown in this patent is employable for converting a door operating apparatus for operating a swinging door from overhead use to underground use. The retrofit kit has had general success in the market place.
Automatic doors are differentiated from manual closers by the fact that manual closers are passive rather than active. A manual closer is a door that includes a manual door closer, that is, a passive device for closing the door. The manual door closer employs a combination of a hydraulic damping system and a spring closing system to self-close the door after a person or thing first manually pushes or pulls the door open. A manual closer is not opened automatically and therefore cannot open by itself. The hydraulic damping system regulates the force required to manually push or pull a door open and regulates the speed at which a door self-closes. Manual door losers may be mounted overhead within a door frame, or on the upper face of a door or frame, or below the door in an underground or sub-floor stratum. An automatic door operator may be employed as a door closer, but a manual door closer can not be employed as an automatic door operator. Manual door closers are passive and do not include electronic components. Some “Medium to Light Duty” manual door closers designed for use in a sub-floor stratum include a mechanism for adjusting the coupling between the door arm and the manual door closer once the manual door closer is cemented in its sub-floor stratum. More particularly, these manual door closers include a mechanism for moving the entire body of the closer in a vertical or horizontal direction to meet the location of the door arm above. The upward movement of this adjustment is constrained when the upward movement causes the closer to contact the threshold or finished floor above the closer. Lateral movements of this adjustment are similarly constrained by the height of the closer relative to the spindle height. Horizontal movement is limited by the threshold or finished floor condition above the closer. Mechanisms for independently adjusting the height of the door closer spindle without raising or lowering the entire body of the manual door closer are unknown. Also, retrofit kits for converting overhead manual door closers to underground manual door closers are unknown.
A manual closer has been converted to an automatic door operator by combining a manual door closer with a hydraulic operating system. A hydraulic operating system employable for this conversion is the Tormax™ Model TN (Tormax is registered trademark of Landert Motoren AG, Bülach-Zürich, Switzerland). The Model TN is a floor mounted door operator and is manufactured as an automatic door operator. The Model TN is not an automatic door operator “conversion system” or kit, it is an automatic door operator. The Model TN is an underground hydraulic closer with a remotely mounted electric pump system that pushes hydraulic fluid within a floor closer to apply torque to a spindle that is rotationally coupled to a door. The pump system and electronics are mounted remotely and are not mounted underground. The Model TN is cemented within a sub-floor stratum and, once it is anchored within the sub-floor stratum, can not be repositioned so as to align the spindle with the door arm. The Model TN lacked a mechanism for re-aligning the spindle after the door operator has been cemented or anchored within its sub-floor stratum. The Model TN requires precise alignment of its spindle with the desired position of the door arm when the device is installed beneath the floor. Alignment adjustments for the Model TN are not available after the device is cemented in place.